The Animation Blog.com | Est. 2007

Pixar Animation Studio’s Up wins the Best Animated Feature honor at the 37th Annual Annie Awards held at UCLA’s Royce Hall on Saturday, Feb. 6.

Walt Disney Animation Studios won six Annies overall including three for its feature The Princess and the Frog and three for its television production Prep and Landing.

DreamWorks Animation won five Annies including Best Television Production for Children and Directing/TV for The Penguins of Madagascar, Character Animation/TV and Storyboarding/Feature for Monsters vs. Aliens and Storyboarding/TV for Merry Madagascar.

Best Home Entertainment Production went to 20th Century Fox’s Futurama: Into the Wild Green Yonder; Best Animated Short Subject went to ShadowMachine’s Robot Chicken: Star Wars 2.5; Acme Filmworks won Best Animated Television Commercial for Spanish Lottery ‘Deportees’; Best Animated Television Production went to Disney’s Prep and Landing; and Best Animated Television Production for Children went to DreamWorks’ The Penguins of Madagascar.

The Winsor McCay award was given to three industry leaders – Tim Burton, Jeffrey Katzenberg and Bruce Timm. Named in honor of the prolific animator, Winsor McCay, this award stands as one of the highest honors given to an individual in the animation industry in recognition for career contributions to the art of animation.

Classic animation fans rejoice! Disney’s return to 2D animation is a success with The Princess and the Frog earning $25 million in its first weekend of nationwide release; enough to take the #1 spot.

The Princess and the Frog is Disney’s first traditionally animated film, with theatrical release, since 2004 when “Home on the Range” had an opening weekend haul of $13.8 million. That film went on to gross $104 million worldwide — a gross that The Princess and the Frog will no doubt eclipse.

The Princess and the Frog is based on The Brothers Grimm’s classic fairy tale “The Frog Prince,” which follows the adventures of a young woman turned into a frog by a kiss from an amphibian.